IN THE GOOD NEWS/BAD NEWS JOKE, ANYTHING GOES

A cynic could find bad news among the good, but that's conditioning

In the newsroom world, the phrases "good news" and "bad news" pretty much have the opposite meanings of the same phrases in the real world.

A "good news" day in the cynical newsroom is a day filled with mayhem, murder and mischief. A "bad news" day is a day in which nothing in particular happens.

In the real world, a "good news" day is usually when only good things happen. Many people call days on which nothing at all happens "good days." A real world "bad news" day is one in which you hear of personal loss, career setback or financial problems.

The last few weeks in the newspaper business have been "good news" weeks – and oddly enough, in both senses of the term.

In recent issues and inside this one, you have read (or will read) about the sterling earnings reports both for the last quarter of 1999 as well as the year overall; that newspaper enterprises are selling for top dollar; that some companies are choosing to focus on papers of a certain size, while others are seeking to focus on regions, and that still others are deciding that it's important to just focus on newspapers and are getting rid of ancillary businesses such as television and radio.

And in the wake of the closure of joint operating agreements (JOAs) in Chattanooga, Tenn., and Evansville, Ind. (and the announced closures in Honolulu and San Francisco), it is encouraging to read Senior Editor Pete Wetmore's report inside that the Seattle Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer have come up with a way to produce and distribute competing JOA papers that are on the same morning cycle.

Further, Senior Correspondent Julius Duscha has found that despite many dire predictions, newspapers have survived the Internet's threat to the classified advertising franchise. His look at newspaper classifieds inside is heartening: Class is up, and many papers have built a new franchise by selling a combination of print and on-line ads.

To top this all off, the Newspaper Association of America (NAA) of Vienna, Va., announced last week that overall advertising spending in daily newspapers was up 5.4 percent for 1999 (with a 5.8 percent increase in the fourth quarter).

As we detailed last time (see NewsInc., Feb. 28, 2000), national advertising was on a tear last year – the official figure is a 17.7 percent increase (that's $6.7 billion) over ’98. Retail and class were up, too (2.8 percent and 4.3 percent, respectively), and total advertising spending in daily newspapers in 1999 was $46.3 billion.

With the bad taste of the early ’90s still fresh in many of our mouths (revenues were down, costs were up, nobody wanted to hire newspaper consultants nor buy newspaper-oriented newsletters), some of us may be looking for a dark cloud among all these silver linings.

Inside, Wetmore's detailing of the merger of more paper suppliers cannot be good for the newspaper industry. The fewer suppliers, the more likely prices will rise. A big hunk of 1999's profits came from low newsprint prices. However, observers note, consolidation may bring some stability to prices. We shall see.

Have newspapers really fought off the new media delivery of classified advertising? Or are we at a point where the technology – and the penetration into households – remains in its infancy?

Will a couple of Canadian technologists be able to achieve their stated goal, as described inside, of wiping "newspapers from the face of the earth?" What do they know that you don't?

Is the news from Wall Street "good news" or is it "good news?" As newspaper publishers such as the New York Times Co. and Knight Ridder position themselves to spin off their new media operations as either new, stand-alone businesses or tracking stocks, is this a good thing or bad?

Maybe we are just too cynical ourselves; maybe we spent too many of our formative years in a place where "good news" and "bad news" meant just the opposite of what they meant outside the business.

Maybe things will be OK, if not great.

– David M. Cole

Inside ...

• Seattle wakes up to two dailies in the morning as the Times goes a.m.
• Times, Journal Register put papers on the block; Lee to leave TV
• Papers turn web threat into an asset while holding onto classifieds
• Trio seeks to beat daily papers with a network of web sites
• Abitibi-Donohue merger raises hopes for stability in newsprint pricing
• Sans ink, sans paper but still sans serif
• Persons

From NEWSINC., March 13, 2000, Copyright © 2000, The Cole Group. All Rights Reserved.